In the process of shipping one or more articles in a container, a packer typically places some type of dunnage material in the shipping container along with the articles. The dunnage material partially or completely fills the empty space, the void volume, around the articles in the container to prevent or minimize any shifting of the articles in the container and/or to cushion the articles in the container during the shipping process. Some commonly used dunnage materials are plastic foam peanuts, plastic bubble pack, air bags and converted paper dunnage.
An exemplary dunnage conversion machine that converts a continuous sheet of paper into a crumpled strip of dunnage is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,676,589. Typically, as the crumpled strip is being discharged from the conversion machine a person, commonly referred to as a packer, guides, pushes and/or folds the crumpled strip into the container. A similar dunnage conversion machine has been incorporated into an automated dunnage filling system that is disclosed in International Patent Publication No. WO 2006/052980, published in the English language on May 18, 2006. Both of these documents are incorporated herein by reference.